


a fronte praecipitium, a tergo lupi

by maidoforleans



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: M/M, Post Reichenbach, Suicidal Thoughts, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-01-06
Updated: 2013-01-06
Packaged: 2017-11-23 23:36:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/627781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maidoforleans/pseuds/maidoforleans
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eventually, Libya will be as good a place as any to start over.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a fronte praecipitium, a tergo lupi

**Author's Note:**

  * For [roane](https://archiveofourown.org/users/roane/gifts).



> I saw this in [a convo posted to Tumblr](http://roane72.tumblr.com/post/39864594120/they-know-me-so-well) and then the muse beat me up and left me in a dark alley with the bits of this story in my pockets. Most of this was cobbled together with the bits and pieces of the reichenfeels fic I started ages ago, but dangit, Roane, your love of Richard Armitage proved stronger than writer's block, so here it is. 
> 
> I should note- I know next to nothing about the logistics or politics of Medicins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders. I know even less about the geography and politics of Libya, but I'm doing my research, and welcome any helpful hints about where to look. There isn't much Libya in this chapter, but there'll be more in 2 and 3. 
> 
> My deepest apologies as this is un beta'd, un brit-picked, and only marginally well-formatted.

 

It's about a month, After, that John goes to see his therapist.  

He goes to see her because it is A Thing To Do. Not _the_ thing, certainly, not the thing that he has been allowing himself to contemplate in the dark small hours of the morning. But he knows it is A Thing To Do, a Thing that gets him out of 221B and into the world of sunshine and life and horrible, bloody humanity that isn't signing on for benefits. So he goes. 

As predicted, it's useless. 'Say the things you didn't say," she tells him. As though that would be of any use. John Watson is all about utility–telling Sherlock anything, at this point, is worse than useless. He'd said the only thing he wanted to say at the grave. He'd made his supplication, and nothing had come of it. The thought of attempting it again is– it's _painful._ And, quite suddenly, John feels quite ready to be done with pain. 

So he does the next Thing that is better than the _thing_ : he calls Greg. And texts Molly Hooper, and when they reply he walks through the rain to a pub that is warm and a little smoky and he waits. They walk through the door together, and John doesn't miss the press of Greg's hand against her lower back. He remembers that awful Christmas party, Before–

He swallows it down and forces himself to smile and stand as they approach the table. 

"God, it's good to see you," Greg says, clapping him on the back. "You, too," John says, giving Molly's hand a quick squeeze. Once they are seated, with beverages working off their foam sweating on coasters in front of them, someone– John thinks it's Greg–starts to ask the question that makes John go all stabby. 

"How are–" 

"I'm fucking awful, Greg, and you bloody well know it." For some reason, this makes Molly laugh, which makes John laugh, and just like that they have agreed to ignore the cloud over the table. They never met up like this, Before. John finds himself feeling quite affectionate towards these two. Here at this table, the  _thing_ he was contemplating, that made him lock his gun away in a safety deposit box, is out of his mind. It won't be another suicide that brings them together. Not his, at any rate. 

Molly is still at Bart's. "My mum said it must be hard, but it's not the first time it was someone I knew, so..." she allows herself to trail off instead of being specific because they all know what she's talking about, what she had to do. Greg is on leave pending investigation into his letting Sherlock all over the Yard cases. "It's not the first time they've done it," he says, and tells John and Molly about the time his super came back and found out Lestrade had forged his approval on Sherlock's consulting contract, only to be mollified by the nearly 58% solve rate Lestrade's division had managed to carry since he'd come on the scene. "He didn't seem to mind so much, after that. I liked Bell. Good bloke. Died about two years ago- heart attack. His second." He'd had one before, apparently, and the doctors had told him not to come back to work, but a cop's a cop, and he'd felt more at home behind his desk than in his split-level with his wife. It seemed only fitting that he'd keeled over at it. 

"How've you been spending your time?" Greg asks him after about the third pint. Molly is listing slightly in her seat, looking at Greg with a kind of fond wariness, and John can see her tense a little at Greg's question. 

"Not doing much, really." John contemplates the glass--bitter, the third of the first drinks he's allowed himself Since–sips, swallows. "I keep trying to clean the flat." 

"Trying?" 

"Yeah. You know, clear the fridge, use the kitchen table for something other than a chem lab." 

"But?" Molly prompts. 

"It was _his_ chem lab. Taking it down seems– I dunno, disrespectful. I bloody hated that shit when he– Before–"– couldn't stand having to use petri dishes for plates since _he'd_ used plates for samples–"But now, every time I say right, today's the day, I'll box all this up, something just–" He swallows around the words. "Stops me." 

"Couldn't his brother help?" The mention of Mycroft has John gripping the glass. "If I thought I could stand seeing him, yeah. He could." 

"Right." Greg looks at his own glass. 

"It's– weird. Somehow. I keep expecting him to waltz back in. You know. Cloud of indignation. Poncy coat. 'Sentiment, John, hampering your brain.' You know." 

"Me, too." Greg says. Molly doesn't say anything, just stares, miserably, at the back of Greg's hand. "Who'm I kidding, really?" John smiles, and he is aware that smiling is now an unfamiliar action for him, that it does not sit well on his face. "I'll get pissed tonight, get home, and attempt to put a lot of breakable glass beakers into bin bags." Greg laughs, and buys them all another round. 

John does get pissed, and he does go home, but he resists the urge to put the lab equipment into bin bags. Instead, he sends a terse SMS to Mycroft, saying that he will be out of the house all day Thursday, and could Mycroft come by to get the lab equipment? There is no response. 

The next morning, John comes downstairs in his pants and dressing gown with an A-1, Level Five, damn-the-torpedoes hangover, and Mycroft is sitting on the sofa. He looks pressed and polished, as always, and as John makes two cups of tea (habit, but at least someone is there to drink the second one today) he looks to John's eyes a little bereft. He isn't carrying his umbrella. His mobile is nowhere to be seen. 

John sits in one of the chairs at the desk and looks at Sherlock's brother. 

"I got your text." 

"Well done, you. And why are you here now, Mycroft?”

Mycroft considers his teacup. "I came to discuss the provisions of my brother's estate." John raised his eyebrows. Did Sherlock plan enough for an estate? 

"Sherlock was not the tidiest of people when it came to matters like this. Our mother, however, brooked no opposition in matters of inheritance- we have an extended family that can be quite-" here Mycroft sneered "-distasteful- when it comes to money."

John put his cup down. Mycroft continued, oblivious to John’s discomfort. "To come to the point, about a year ago my brother instructed our family solicitors to draw up a new will, which left his trust fund and his share in 221b baker street, among other properties, entirely to you." 

John covered his face with his hand. "Sherlock was rich." a question phrased as a statement. Mycroft gave a grim little smile.

"Very, as it happens."

"Did he even need a flatmate?" 

"More than you know." 

"So... So he left me a lot of money." 

"Our family- yes. Yes he did."

"I don't want his money, Mycroft."

"Surely you would-" 

“I don't want his money. Hang on, if he owned this flat, who the hell have I been paying rent to?”

"That money was set aside in a savings account for you. It is, of course, available at any time."

John feels like crying, again, though surely his body doesn't contain that much saline. Nothing in med school had prepared him for this inexhaustibility of human grief, the endless well of pain and sadness his brain seems ready at all times to remind him of. He sniffs and his composure snaps, and he is weeping, weeping for Sherlock, for himself, for the days they will never share.

"I'll let you think about it," Mycroft says, gently, and presses a business card into John’s hand, holding on for a moment more than necessary, and he leaves silently, and John is crying, and it has been a month.

John comes to later that afternoon, in a ball on the floor next to the coffee table, Mycroft’s sodden card still clutched in his hand. He had cried himself to unconsciousness, in a way he hadn’t done since he was quite small. He gets up and he showers and he puts on clothing. John looks at the flat and the chemistry equipment. He decides, against the tightness in his chest, that he desperately wants the kitchen table back, and so he goes down to Mrs. Hudson, and asks for boxes. She sniffles a little but gives them to him, and he goes back upstairs and slowly, piece by piece, he packs up to lab equipment. Half of it, he notices through tears, is from St. Bart's, and these pieces he sets aside. He'll bring them to Molly later. 

Packing the kitchen lab up is about all he can manage, that day. It is a triumph. He collapses on the sofa and makes a list on his phone, of all the Things That Should Be Done, like #3 ~~Clean out~~ (Replace?) the fridge, #22 Job? ~~#30 Call Harry~~. The doing of the things of the list he left to be considered another day.

Four days after Mycroft’s visit, John takes the lab equipment back to Bart’s, all of it, even the things that weren’t strictly the university’s property. He leaves them in the morgue with a note for Molly, feeling only vaguely guilty about leaving it with her and, once he is out of the building, feeling extremely guilty about not feeling guilty. He sets his guilt aside and once he is out of the tube at Baker Street—no use in wasting money on cabs, now that it is just him—he texts Mycroft.

_I still can’t take the money. I’ll take my rent fund, and Baker Street. If you don’t mind. Nothing else. JW_

He is back at 221B and sitting with a mug of tea that he has only vague plans to drink when his mobile chimes.

_The money is still yours, John. Your past rent payments have been credited to your bank account. The deed to your flat at 221 will be with you shortly. MH_

John pulls out his laptop to verify his bank balance and his heart wraps itself around his lungs as his browser opens to the last webpage visited: the New England Journal of Medicine, an article on rare blood disorders in Mongolia. It wasn’t his last page visited, which, if he recalled correctly, was a half-hearted look at a dating website. This must have been Sherlock, stealing his computer. He closes his eyes counts to ten. Calls up his bank webpage and there it is, all the money he’d paid to “Mrs. Hudson” to live in his own flat, for two years. Christ. 

And like a bad penny, her cheery voice filtered up the stairs. “Yoo-hoo!” He shut his computer and forced himself to look up, look pleasant, force his face into that strange rictus of a smile, greet her normally as she came into the kitchen and started bustling about, making him a cup of tea.

“I see you put those boxes to good use,” she says, and then catches herself, and as she hands him his cuppa he can see her sniffing a little. He pats her hand and says “Yes, I did. Boxed it all up and took it back to Bart’s. You know I think he nicked most of it?” She laughed at that, and told John a story about when she had first met Sherlock, and he’d been practicing conning packs of cigarettes out of (mostly) unsuspecting convenience store clerks in Gainesville. John laughs and wants to cry and doesn’t, and when she gets up to make another cuppa he follows her. He forces himself to appear casual as he leans against the counter and asks, as she boils water—

“So I haven’t been paying you, all this time?” 

She turns to him with eyes fuzzy with tears. “Oh, John.” She begins to cry and he gives her a tentative hug—he has never hugged Mrs. Hudson before, and he finds it odd, but nice—and she cries harder, her mascara leaving black marks on the sleeve of his red shirt. When she has calmed down a bit she wipes her eyes and continues boiling water as though it hadn’t happened.

“It was that brother of his had the idea. I had this house and these flats, and it was an awful lot to keep up with on my own. Mycroft gave me the cash to fix up this place and then I contacted Sherlock. I’m sure he knew about it, but he never said, because I think he liked living here. It’s certainly much nicer than that _awful_ flat he had over on Montague street. Did you ever see it? No, no of course you didn’t.  Horrible, cramped rooms, and him never bothering to take out his rubbish unless Mycroft sent his people to take care of it.” John laughs.

“Yes, I can see that.” 

“Anyway, Mycroft said that I should just endorse the checks over to him and he’d put them all into an account for you. I think he thought it’d be a nice wedding present for the two of you.”

“We weren’t–" the old protest dies on his lips and his eyes blur before he blinks his way back into the moment.

“You hadn’t?”

“No.” He doesn’t bother to elaborate. 

Mrs. Hudson smiles the only kind of smile she has lately, a sad one, and pats his hand. “You’ll find yourself someone nice one of these days. I know it’ll take a while.”

“I don’t–"  _I don’t want anyone else. I don’t want any other life. What I had in this flat with him, it’s all I want. It’s all I’ve ever wanted and there were so many blind, dumb years when I didn’t know that._  

She stands and clears away the tea things, changing the subject to the married ones next door, and how maybe they’d have someone nice in their circle for John to meet, and he doesn’t have the heart to her that he wasn’t _broadly_ gay, just, apparently pining for his dead flatmate. He’d pined for him alive, more or less. Too bad he hadn’t said anything.

She leaves and he is alone in the flat, and it’s evening. He watches the traffic on Baker Street, watches the bright windows bare of curtains of the empty house across the street as the realtor walks the room, gesticulating to someone he can’t see. He closes the curtains and sits down on the sofa. He unbuttons his top shirt and lies down, and before he goes to sleep, he wishes, not for the first time, that he had known Sherlock earlier.

 

*** 

 

It is three months, After. For some reason the page on blood disorders in Mongolia has stayed up on John’s laptop. Midway through a truly epic week of benders John had discovered the other windows running quietly in the background—white papers on prison populations in Eastern Europe, history of violence between Chechnya and Russia, the Medecins sans Frontières webpage. He had closed out all the tabs almost on sight but the MSF page had stayed open, stubbornly. Or maybe he hadn’t made an effort to close it.

It is a crazy idea, of course. John has found a job, at an A&E in Zone 4, which takes him years to get to every day but which is just mad enough to keep him distracted, just exhausting enough that he drops into a heap on his bed every night and resolutely does not dream of Sherlock. And he does good, he knows he does, every day, when he helps patch a life back together or makes sure that if a life ends, it ends with a maximum of care on his part. But it’s not the same as being in the Army, and it’s not the same as being with Sherlock.  After a while every knife wound and car accident bleeds into the next. He can see the day coming when he will be just as bored by this job as he was by the clinic, as he was in his bedsit after being discharged.

So maybe it’s not such a crazy idea. He does his research. He fills out a few form and submits them before he loses his nerve. He even, God help him, calls up Harry, and they have a civil and supportive conversation for the first time in nearly five years.

He lets himself forget about the forms he’s sent in until one day he receives a call on his mobile. Blocked number. Mycroft.

“Dr. Watson. Are you free for coffee?”

“You’re parked outside, Mycroft, just come in. For fuck’s sake.”

He hangs up and a few moments later Mycroft is standing in the sitting room of 221B, for the first time in two months. John is reminded that he has not touched the flat fund. 

“Have a seat, Mycroft. Tea?”

“No thank you, Dr. Watson, I cannot stay long. I am given to understand that you have applied to be a member of Medecins Sans Frontieres.”

“I wonder that you had to come all this way for confirmation. Surely your sources can be trusted.”

“Answer the question, please, Dr. Watson.” He seems angry, somehow, and John doesn’t know what to make of that. Why would Mycroft care?

“I have, yes. I haven’t heard back yet.”

“You will, and soon. May I ask what on earth possessed you to do such a thing?”  
  
“Well, the Army wouldn’t take me back, even if I asked.”

“I would certainly hope not.” 

“I got wounded in the shoulder, Mycroft, not the head. I am perfectly capable of continuing my work as a medical professional.”  
  
“You have been doing so. I had understood that the accident and emergency—"

“Is fine. Just fine. And it will continue being fine. Until the day that it isn’t fine.  That’s the day that I’m worried about, Mycroft.” 

“This insistence on endangering yourself—"

“I’m trying to do something good with my life, Mycroft. A&E doctors are a dime a dozen. I can even still work there between MSF tours. And, hang on, I haven’t even heard for sure that I’ve been accepted, I’ve not even had an _interview—_ why, exactly, are you here?” 

Mycroft schools his features into something approaching concern. “John, I am simply worried for your welfare, both psychological and physical. Doctors Without Borders is often unable to secure the security of its physicians, and I could not in good conscience permit you to—“

“Permit me? Sod right the fuck _off,_ Mycroft.”

Mycroft has the temerity to look shocked.

“This is my life, Mycroft. Not yours. Not,” he swallows, “Sherlock’s. Mine. And I will live it in the best way I see fit.”

Mycroft clenches his jaw the tiniest bit. “Yes, you will.” He draws himself up and holds out his hand. “Take care of yourself, Doctor Watson.”

John takes his hand and shakes it. Mycroft pulls him close for a moment, and John is left craning his neck to keep his gaze. “I do mean that, John. Take care.”

“Or what?” 

“Sherlock might think that my reach is infinite, that my power has no boundaries. It does have boundaries, John, and I cannot abide the thought that something could befall you outside of them.” He releases John and makes for the door.

John’s mobile rings.

“You’ll want to take that,” Mycroft calls over his shoulder.

John answers his phone. “Doctor John Watson? This is Priya Sand from MSF/Doctors Without Borders. Is this a good time?”

 

***

 

It is five months After. John goes dutifully every week out to the gravesite. He’s discovered the Megabus route that costs twenty pounds less round trip than the train, even though the train is much more comfortable, but he’s only got his army pension now and he really would rather save the Flat Fund as he’s come to call it for a rainier day. It’s raining the day John gets off the bus in Sussex with a book and a few paracetamol in a baggie in his pocket. His shoulder has been paining him. He knows full well that if he would just sleep in his bed it would be better, but he cannot bring himself to fall asleep anywhere other than the sofa.

John realizes that it is a terrible, self-destructive idea. He cannot bring himself to care. He still has not thought seriously of the _thing_ but has also retrieved his gun from the safe deposit box. He has seen Molly and Greg sixteen times since that first night. Molly and Greg got together, briefly, then broke up. It was probably for the best. At any rate, it hasn’t affected their camaraderie on those pub nights. With the new training and the extra hours he’s been pulling in at the A&E he’s been keeping himself on the edge of collapse for weeks. He’s never felt better.

The rain is filthy, raw and pounding. He is soaked through and has given up on his umbrella because it is hideously windy, and he makes his way through the sleepy, shut-up village to the churchyard that he privately thinks Sherlock would have _massively_ hated. There are flowers on his grave, again, though it wasn’t John who left them. He clears them off and dusts off the letters, and stands, and asks. He asks the same thing he’s asked every week for the last five months. _Please. Please come back._ He’s never screamed. He’s cried loads. He’s never resorted to violence against the headstone, or yelling at the top of his lungs, though he knows he’s a right to.

All he has is supplication. And once again, it doesn’t work. He feels the prickle on the back of his neck, as though he is being watched, but ignores it—it has been there every week, and for the first two months, was proven to be a reporter for the _Sun_ who was taking pictures of him, grief-stricken and limping. John had found him and beaten him into unconsciousness with his own camera. 

It hadn’t made him feel any better.

Another week and his miracle isn’t answered. He nods at Sherlock’s grave and clears away the wilted, sodden flowers, and heads towards town. He has enough time for a pint before the return bus to London.  

Two days later, John locks the door to 221B, and gives Mrs. Hudson a kiss on the cheek. He hugs Harry, who has come to see him off. There is a car waiting at the kerb, and a plane ticket in his pocket. He’s going to New York, and then to Kyrgyzstan. He doesn’t know when he’s going to be back.  

 

*** 

 

Kyrgyzstan in the autumn wasn’t top on John’s list of vacation spots. It was cold, and rainy, and he was working in prisons, doing tuberculosis tests on prisoners who look like they could break him in half if they tried. The work was hard but rewarding, and his fellow MSF doctors were interesting. He felt better than he had in months. He was done there after only two weeks, before being pulled out and sent to Libya. The political situation was heating up there, and doctors were in urgent need. And since he still remembers a little bit of his Arabic—he’d been brushing up in his spare time, and trying to learn a bit of Russian and Kyrgz while he was at it—he was very high on the list to be relocated. He wonders if this is because the Brits have a stronger hold in the Middle East than in Eastern Europe, the better for Mycroft to keep an eye on him, but dismisses the thought as being inordinately self-centered. Surely, with all of Mycroft’s devotion to keeping track of Sherlock’s possessions, he has better things to do.

These thoughts kept him company on the three flights he took to get to Libya, and he is still absorbed in them when a jeep with the MSF logo and a red cross on the side pulls up in front of the airport. John picks up his duffel and walks towards the Jeep’s driver, who is walking towards him with his hand held out. For a moment, John thinks he is having a heart attack. _No,_ his brain tells him. It’s just his feelings, reactivating after six months of numbness.

 The jeep’s driver has reached him and is shaking his hand, nearly crushing it in his enthusiasm. He’s introducing himself and John didn’t catch the name, too busy staring like a tit into greyish-green eyes in a criminally handsome face.

 After a moment he realized that he was still hanging onto this man’s hand. He let go and shook his head.

 “I’m so sorry, I seem to be still asleep. Will you please tell me your name again now that I have woken up?” He said, in what he hoped was a nonchalant voice. The man laughed, a deep and throaty sound.

 “Trevor, Victor Trevor. And you must be Doctor Watson. Delighted to make your acquaintance. I must say I’m glad to have a fellow countryman in the centre now- our last one was a Scot and shipped out after only three weeks because he couldn’t stand the scorpions.” He leaned down and picked up John’s kit in one hand, and made his way towards the Jeep, John following.

 “What are a few scorpions among friends?” John said, realizing that the lovely warm feeling wafting over him must be that of déjà vu. He’d had this conversation before hundreds of time, with Murray and the lads in Afghanistan. Scorpions and the comforts of home and an English voice. The inside of the jeep was a welcome relief from the lingering heat.

 Dr. Trevor took a pair of sunglasses from the visor and put them on. “Buckle up. The roads between here and Aleppo are, frankly, shit.”

 “Do we merit an escort, then, or are we on our own?” 

“On our own, I’m afraid. Things aren’t too bad at the moment. Next week things are going to be a bit touchy, from what we’ve heard.”

 On the five hour drive from Tripoli to Sabha Victor filled John in on their situation- three doctors, attached to the central hospital in Sabha.  John allowed himself to be caught up in the low hum of his voice, his clipped RP tones. It sounded familiar and alien at the same time, and after about four hours John realized that he was paying a good bit of attention to the tanned grip of Victor’s hand on the gear shift.

 “So where’d you study, Dr. Watson?”

“Bart’s. You?”

“Cambridge. Seems ages ago, doesn’t it?”

“Christ, yes.”

Victor smiled at him, turning his attention back to the road. “So, left a Mrs. Watson back in Blighty?”

Careful, casual.

“Why not a Mr. Watson?” _Jesus._

Victor stills, slightly. “Why not, indeed?”

“No, no Mr. No Mrs., either. You?”

“Not for me. There’s not many would put up with this life for long, to be honest.”

“How long have you been with MSF?” 

“Ten years.”

 “Blimey.”

Victor laughed. “Indeed, Dr. Watson. Indeed.”

John could feel a flush starting. It was six months, After. Six months to the day. The road to Sabha stretched out before him. He looked at Victor’s hand on the gear shift, at the line of his tan peeking out from his shirt sleeves. Libya. As good a place as any to start over.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> The previous internal investigation Lestrade references is a shameless nod to my only other fic, [follow the cops back home](http://archiveofourown.org/works/413489)
> 
> Title is latin for "The cliffs in front, the wolves behind." Or, between a rock and a hard place, the devil & the deep blue sea. 
> 
> Chapter title is from The Mountain Goats masterful song "No Children." 
> 
>  
> 
> _I hope that our few remaining friends_  
>  Give up on trying to save us  
> I hope we come out with a fail-safe plot  
> To piss off the dumb few that forgave us


End file.
